Fraserburgh (locally known as The Broch) is a fishing port in Aberdeenshire, with a population in 2020 of 13,000. In the 19th century it was a major port for herring, and shell-fishing is still an important local industry. It hosts the Museum of Scottish Lighthouses.

Understand

Atlantic herring

Atlantic herring Clupea harengus are about 30 cm long and lie mid-way in the food chain. They stay deep in daylight hours but at night come shallow to feed on tiny copepods and krill, attacking in large shoals so that as these agile sea-fleas jump out of the way, they land in the next herring's mouth. Sea-birds and large mammals are drawn to the shoals, and dolphins may herd them into "bait-balls". They can live over 20 years but their apex predator, human fisherfolk, makes sure they don't. Herring are found worldwide but off the British Isles they traditionally followed a circuit, off the north coast of Scotland in summer and in the North Sea off Grimsby and Lowestoft through winter. The fishing fleets followed the shoals and Fraserburgh, with the best harbour on this coast and a large fleet, could fish in all these waters and away out to Greenland and the Banks of Newfoundland.

Herring is an oily fish and once landed, it must be gutted and cured quickly before it rots. An army of seasonal workers, mostly female, moved from port to port to do so, gaining money in their own pockets and an independent outlook. The Government subsidised the industry and railways took away the barrels of fish. At its peak at the start of the 20th century there were 30,000 boats involved, a third of them Scottish, and 2,500,000 barrels per year were exported to Germany, Russia and the Baltic countries - ten barrels makes one ton.

The trade was disrupted by wartime, and from the 1960s all UK fisheries declined through over-fishing, but the herring vanished. Probably this was through damage to their spawning grounds and juvenile "nursery" areas, which are shallow and vulnerable to other activities such as scallop-dredging. Fraserburgh fell on hard times: it got by (and still does) with shellfishing, but never benefitted from the Aberdeen oil boom. It has taken 50 years for concerted action to protect the shoals. In 2019 mass herring spawning was observed in the North Sea, and since they reach maturity after 3 years, we may be about to see a return of the "silver darling" of old.

The town suffered lifeboat disasters in 1919, 1953 and 1970 while assisting stricken fishing boats.

Get in

There is no railway station in Fraserburgh - indeed, few towns of this size are further from the railway network. The nearest station is at Aberdeen, about 40 miles to the south - but fortunately there is a relatively frequent bus service provided by Stagecoach. There are two buses an hour during the bulk of the day Monday-Saturday, taking 90 min (numbers X67/X68) - these operate via Ellon, Mintlaw, and New Leeds (X67) or Strichen (X68). The service is less frequent in the late evening (every 1-2 hours) or on Sundays (hourly) and is numbered 68.

Services to other destinations are more limited - Stagecoach routes 69/69A connect Fraserburgh and Peterhead approximately every two hours, with journey times of 40-50 mins depending on the exact villages served along the coast between them. Watermill operate a couple of buses per day (not Sundays) between Banff and Fraserburgh on routes 271/273, taking about an hour.

By car, the A90 comes all the way from Perth - though it runs indirectly through Peterhead, so follow the signs for Fraserburgh on the A952 to avoid that diversion by staying inland. Driving from Aberdeen is typically about an hour; from Dundee it would take about two hours, and from the Central Belt reckon on 3-4 hours of travel time (excluding any breaks).

Get around

Walk, but at night give a wide berth to drunks.

Taxi firms are First Cabs (+44 7774 028139), SM Taxis (+44 7411 752323) and Doug's (☏ +44 1346 512882).

See

• 1 Museum of Scottish Lighthouses, Stevenson Road AB43 9DU, ☏ +44 1346 511022. Nov-Mar: W-Su 10AM-4:30PM; Apr-Oct: daily 10AM-5PM. By the 18th century, makeshift lighthouses were obviously inadequate for the growth in shipping. This was partly driven by conflict with France, which made the Channel dangerous, so shipping went all the way north around Scotland to reach the Atlantic. A programme of lighthouse construction began and the town's 16th-century Kinnaird Castle in 1787 became the site of the first lighthouse on mainland Scotland. It's now a museum; entry to the lighthouse itself is by guided tour on the hour. The modern automated lighthouse is adjacent. Tours may take in the Wine (or Wynd) Tower, probably just a medieval storeroom, but inevitably with a hoaky legend attached. "Ooh, and on a dark stormy night you can still hear the ghostly piper of - <insert castle name here>". Adult £8.80. (updated May 2020)
• Fraserburgh Heritage Centre, Quarry Rd AB43 9DT (next to Lighthouse Museum), ☏ +44 1346 512888. Apr-Oct: M-Sa 10AM-4PM, Su 11AM-4PM. In a former warehouse for herring barrels, it's now a volunteer-run local history museum. Adult £6. (updated May 2020)
• 2 Harbour: it's long past its heyday as a herring fishing port, but still busy with small vessels landing shellfish and white fish.
• Churches: several were built in the 19th century for the booming population of fisherfolk. They include Fraserburgh Baptist Church; Fraserburgh Old Parish Church (the oldest); Our Lady, Star of the Sea Roman Catholic Church; South Church; St Peter's Episcopal Church; and West Church.
• 3 Memsie Round Cairn is just a large heap of stones to look at, but it's a 4000-year-old burial site.

Fraserburgh Harbour

• 4 Maggie's Hoosie in Inverallochy is a small museum in a former fisherman's cottage.
• The Knuckle is a name given to the promontory where the coast turns east into the Moray Firth, and a 1949 account describes "Nine castles of the Knuckle". Kinnaird Castle and the Wine Tower (above) are two of them. Going southeast are Cairnbulg, Inverallochy (just a shard of masonry), Lonmay (gone), and Rattray (gone). West are Pitullie, Pitsligo and Dundarg (below).
• 5 Cairnbulg Castle is a Z-plan castle, from early 14th century but rebuilt several times. It's seldom open to the public.
• 6 Loch of Strathbeg or Rattray Water was an inlet of the sea until 1720, with Rattray its harbour. It was already silting up when a great storm hurled a spit of sand across the bay and cut off the loch. It's now a wildlife reserve managed by RSPB. A ship laden with slates found itself trapped on the loch, so its slates were used in the village, but that was the only good luck blown by that ill wind. Rattray in one night lost its castle (seen as divine punishment for their playing cards on a Sunday) and its harbour, so it became depopulated. See the ruin here of St Mary's Chapel; Rattray Head lighthouse is intact.
• Cairness House four miles south of town is a grand late-18th century neo-classical mansion designed by Playfair. It's a private residence and you don't see much of it from the public road.
• 7 Castle of Pitullie and 8 Pitsligo Castle are ruins near Rosehearty, west of Fraserburgh.
• Dundarg Castle is little more than a grassy hillock on the coast towards Gardenstown, you just come for the sea views.

Do

Rattray harbour became an inland lake: divine punishment for playing cards on Sunday

• The best beach is east of town by the golf course, stretching round the bay to Inverallochy.
• The Leisure Centre on Seaforth St has ten-pin bowling, snooker and pool. It's open daily 9AM-11PM.
• There are fitness centres at James Ramsay Park, Denmark St and High St.
• Fraserburgh Golf Club is on Philorth Links, on the coast south edge of town.

Buy

• Tesco and Lidl are on the main road south end of town.
• The Farmers Market is held in Saltoun Square on the second Saturday of the month 10AM-3:30PM.

Eat

• There's a slew of cheap eats along High St and Cross St, with pizza, Chinese, tandoori, kebabs and fish & chips, eat in or takeaway.
• 1 Captain's Table, 20 Seaforth St AB43 9BB, ☏ +44 1771 512412. Tu-Su noon-3PM, 5-8:30PM. Casual dining. Dogs welcome. (updated May 2020)
• 2 Last Bus Works Canteen, Quarry Rd, New Pitsligo AB43 7RA, ☏ +44 1771 653288. Sa Su 10:30AM-5:30PM. Quirky vegan cafe ten miles southwest of Fraserburgh. Hours erratic, ring ahead before travelling any distance. (updated May 2020)
• Herring though there's no saying where it's come from. It can be eaten raw, salted, pickled, or (holding your nose) fermented, and in Arbroath it's smoked. Fraserburgh hews to the standard Scottish method of filleting, coating in seasoned pin-head oatmeal, then pan-frying and serving with boiled potatoes.

Drink

Maggie's Hoosie, Inverallochy

• Ship Inn (The Galleon), 147 Shore St AB43 9BP. M-Th 9AM-midnight, F Sa 9AM-1AM, Su 10AM-midnight. Friendly old-style pub by the harbour. (updated Oct 2021)
• Balaclava Bar, 79 Shore St AB43 9BT. Daily 9AM-1AM. By the harbour with beer garden, often has live music. Cash only. (updated Oct 2021)
• Elizabethan, 36 Union Grove AB43 9PH. Daily noon-11PM. Nothing visibly Elizabethan about it (HMQ first or second) but a decent enough pub with an L-shape bar. Sometimes has live music. (updated Oct 2021)
• The Royal is the British Legion pub at 42 School St.
• Deejays is a nightclub on Denmark St.

Sleep

• 1 Fraserburgh Campsite, South Harbour Road AB43 9TB, ☏ +44 1346 379162, fraserburgh-campsite@hotmail.com. Simple well-run caravan and campsite open April-Oct. Dogs welcome. Tent £15, caravan £25. (updated May 2020)
• Findlay's is a decent three-star on Smiddyhill Road.
• 2 Saltoun Inn Hotel (JD Wetherspoon), Saltoun Square AB43 9DA, ☏ +44 1346 519548. 11-room small hotel run by JD Wetherspoon. Gets mixed reviews, Spoons are usually commendably consistent so they need to get a grip here. No availability shown for 2020. (updated May 2020)

Connect

As of Oct 2021, Fraserburgh has 4G with all UK carriers, but 5G has not reached this area.

Go next

• Gardenstown is a picturesque little fishing village to the west.
• Peterhead to the southeast is another fishing village.
• Methlick inland has grand Haddo House and what's left of Gight Castle, Byron's ancestral home.

Routes through Fraserburgh

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